In the field of ink jet printing, there have existed long felt needs for making images waterfast and also durable against physical abrasion. One method practiced in the art is to laminate a clear film on the printed image after the image has been printed on a receiver. However, such a lamination method is time consuming and often produces undesirable waste due to print handling and unusable prints caused by the air bubbles trapped between the lamination sheet and the ink receiver. The lamination method also increases media and equipment costs because of the additional sheet and apparatus involved.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,635,969 discloses an ink jet printer that includes a print head for depositing an ink precursor on the ink recording medium. The ink precursor conditions the ink recording medium before colored ink spots are placed on the conditioned areas. The preconditioning of the recording medium can be used for reducing paper cockle and color bleed, for decreasing dry time, and for improving dot shape.